Barbara Roberts

Barbara K. Roberts (born December 21, 1936, in Corvallis, Oregon) is a Democratic politician. She served as Governor of Oregon from 1991 to 1995, the first and, to date, only woman to be elected to that office. Roberts is a fourth generation Oregonian and grew up in Sheridan, Oregon, where she graduated from Sheridan High School. She attended Portland State University from 1961 to 1964 and, later, the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and Marylhurst University.

T oday, I honor the memory of those brave settlers of Oregon, and pay tribute, as well, to the native Americans already inhabiting this land before pioneers like my great-great-grandparents arrived here in the mid-1800’s. Such dreams those pioneers had for this territory. Some instinct drew them here, a fate a pulling, a desire for deep and lasting change in their lives. They embraced that change. They sought it out. Theirs was a quest for new horizons, for new beginnings. For a new homeland. They rode. They walked. They staved. They forge. And they died. But they kept their eyes westward. They gave us Oregon.